One word that is sabotaging your homeschool success

We have all been conditioned to believe a lie.

A one word lie.

The lie that there is such a thing as "behind" in education.

When a baby walks a little later than expected, friends and family say "don't worry, she will get it when she's ready".

When a toddler isn't potty trained by 3, friends and family say "don't worry, he won't go to college in diapers".

But when a child gets to school age, and is struggling with reading, we worry that he will "fall behind".

When that child does continue to struggle in school, and we bring them home to homeschool, our number one worry becomes that he is "behind" and the thinking usually goes that it's our job to help him get "caught up".

We try curriculum after curriculum, trying to find the magic bullet that will rocket him up to where he is "supposed" to be.

We worry that he will never catch up.

Sometimes we even lie awake at night imagining that he will never learn to read or do algebra or write a cohesive paragraph.

Eventually someone suggests not comparing him to public school, and to stop trying to "fix" him, because there is nothing wrong, he just has a different time table - harkening back to those suggestions from babyhood - "don't worry, he will get it when he's ready".

But the fear of him falling even further "behind" has such a grip on us, we have been so conditioned by the conveyor-belt approach to education, that we have a very hard time shifting our paradigm, and in the process, our child comes to believe he is dumb, that he will never get it, and that he hates learning. 

What a tragedy.

Truly, no child is "behind", they are uniquely made, and that's not wrong. 

Just like Elizabeth Ann in Understood Betsy, we fear that being different means there is something wrong.

“What's the matter?" asked the teacher, seeing her bewildered face.

"Why—why," said Elizabeth Ann, "I don't know what I am at all. If I'm second-grade arithmetic and seventh-grade reading and third-grade spelling, what grade am I?"

The teacher laughed at the turn of her phrase. "You aren't any grade at all, no matter where you are in school. You're just yourself, aren't you? What difference does it make what grade you're in! And what's the use of your reading little baby things too easy for you just because you don't know your multiplication table?” 

-- Dorothy Canfield Fisher, Understood Betsy

That teacher knew the truth. The truth that each child is unique and there is no point to trying to force them neatly into a single grade-level. 

Did you know that originally the grades were meant to be sequential developmentally, meaning that when you mastered the first grade material, you moved on to second grade material, regardless of age.

But now, the grade levels are tied to age. So that if you have an 8 year old who is not a fluent reader yet, they are labeled "behind" instead of just being first grade level in reading.

Tying age to grade level has created this belief that all children must be on the same level in all subjects, or there is something wrong with them.

If you look at that logically, it doesn't make any sense.

Adults are not held to this arbitrary pattern.

If a woman is an engineer, she is not told she is behind if she doesn't also perform at that same level in writing, and history, and music.

If a man is a screen writer, he is not told he is behind if he isn't at that same level in math and science and art.

That would be absurd.

Not everyone needs to be at the same level in everything, and that goes for children too.

So please, let's just toss the word "behind" out of our homeschools.

There is no such thing. It is a creation of the conveyor-belt system and is irrelevant to our children's education. 

Your children are not "behind", they are just themselves
and they have their own path. 

So if you notice yourself thinking this sabotaging thought, remind yourself that it is a lie, and you don't have to listen to that lie any more.

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